Biased USA Today/Gallup Poll offers false choice on immigration

The March 2-4, 2007 USA Today/Gallup Poll has a question on immigration that features a false choice:

Which comes closest to your view about what government policy should be toward illegal immigrants currently residing in the United States? Should the government -- [ROTATED: deport all illegal immigrants back to their home country, allow illegal immigrants to remain in the United States in order to work, but only for a limited amount of time, or allow illegal immigrants to remain in the United States and become U.S. citizens, but only if they meet certain requirements over a period of time]?

According to them, 59% of respondents chose the last of the three options. Let's see if their following paragraph gives us a clue as to why this poll was designed to deceive:

Given these three options, the majority of Americans, 59%, support the government allowing illegal immigrants to remain in this country and eventually become U.S. citizens if they meet certain requirements. Fifteen percent of Americans support allowing illegal immigrants to stay in the country to work for a limited period of time. About one in four Americans, 24%, say all illegal immigrants should be deported back to their home countries.

There are other options, such as enforcing our current laws. Gallup simply offered the standard false choice that cheap labor supporters continually use, offering a choice between massive deportations and a massive amnesty.

Please let them know what you think: galluppoll.com/contactUs

Related:
Gallup poll: Only 25% approve of Bush's handling of immigration
January 2005 Gallup immigration poll
Gallup poll: 49% want immigration decreased
"55% oppose plan on immigrant jobs, poll shows"

Comments

You're a mean one, Mr. Grinch!

This is an obvious push poll in which the "pollster" or more accurately the people or group who are paying for the poll are trying to get a specific answer. They are doing this by limiting the options. Do you notice that the response (59 + 24 + 15) is almost 100%. Do you really believe that only about 2% said not sure or none of the above (option not given in the questions)? What I suspect is happening is that the people being polled are either being forced to pick one of the offered options or their opinion is not being counted on this question. CIS recently had a poll conducted that offered massive deportations, the "let 'em stay" option, and attrition through enforcement. The responses ran 20% for massive deportation, 31% for "let 'em stay", and 44% for attrition through enforcement. Please note that massive deportation + enforcement is TWICE the "let 'em stay" percent. 5% said they didn't know or refused to answer. Which poll do you think is more accurate?